The present invention relates to the confinement of a granular fluent material to form temporary barrier structures. More particularly, the present invention provides a fluent material confinement system configured to be easily deployable in low visibility conditions and/or rapidly joinable to adjacent fluent material confinement systems to form an extended structure.
Flooding is one of the most common natural disasters. When a danger of a flood arises, sometimes the only possible measure to take to prevent loss of lives and/or damage to property is to construct a temporary barrier to divert or contain the floodwaters. These structures most commonly take the form of a wall constructed of sand-filled bags.
While sandbag walls may provide a measure of protection against the forces of floodwaters, they also have several drawbacks. For example, the construction of a sandbag wall may require a large number of people and an excessive amount of time to fill the bags and arrange them into a barrier structure. Also, a sandbag wall may have points of weakness, as the individual sandbags are generally merely stacked upon one another, rather than being attached to one another. Furthermore, the sandbags are generally not reusable. Thus, they may require an expensive and time-consuming disposal process, and new ones may need to be purchased after each emergency event in anticipation of future emergency events. Therefore, there remains a need for a rapidly deployable system for the construction of temporary barrier structures that is suitable for use in protecting property and lives during floods.
One aspect of the present invention provides a collapsible fluent material confinement system configured to receive a granular fluent material to form a temporary barrier structure. The fluent material confinement system includes a plurality of strips coupled to one another to form an array of collapsible cells, wherein the array of collapsible cells is configured to be movable between a collapsed configuration and an open configuration. The fluent material confinement system also includes a deployment indicator disposed on a selected strip, wherein the deployment indicator is configured to be effective in low visibility conditions to indicate to a user how to move the grid from the collapsed configuration to the open configuration.
Another aspect of the present invention provides a fluent material confinement system configured to receive a granular fluent solid to form a temporary barrier structure. The fluent material confinement system includes a plurality strips, the plurality of strips including a plurality of lengthwise strips and a plurality of widthwise strips coupled with each other to define a plurality of open cells, wherein each strip of the plurality of strips has opposing ends, and wherein each end has an edge. The fluent material confinement system also includes at least one connecting structure formed in an end of a selected strip. The connecting structure is configured to be coupled to a complementary connecting structure on an adjacent grid to connect the grid to the adjacent grid, and includes an aperture formed in the end of the selected strip at a location spaced from the edge of the end of the selected strip.
Yet another aspect of the present invention provides a method of forming a temporary barrier structure. The method includes providing a fluent material confinement system, the confinement system including a plurality of open cells, wherein the plurality of open cells includes a plurality of inner cells at least partially bordered by a plurality of outer border cells, filling the outer border cells with a first material, and filling the inner cells with a second, granular fluent material.